Thursday

Lance Houston was born in Boston and is, by many accounts, one of the best jazz musicians playing in Boston right now.

Lance Houston was born in Boston and is, by many accounts, one of the best jazz musicians playing in Boston right now.

But he calls Fall River home.

"I live in Fall River; I feel like Fall River is my true home. It's the place I feel the most comfortable," said Houston, a 1992 graduate of BMC Durfee High School and leader of The Lance Houston Jazz Quartet, a group earning quite the reputation as one of the top jazz quartets in Bean Town.

Houston and his bandmates — bassist Cyrus Sink, drummer Willie Rodriguez and pianist Peter Young, all of Boston — play regularly at big Boston jazz clubs, hotels and events, but they record and practice at Houston's Fall River home, focusing on jazz standards with their own unique style of improvisation and interpretation.

Houston himself is a self-taught flugelhornist. A flugelhorn is a brass horn of German descent that resembles a trumpet, but produces a "warmer, deeper, softer tone," Houston said.

As a musician, Houston has been likened to Freddie Hubbard and Woody Shaw, and counts among his influences Miles Davis, Hubbard, Wynton Marsalis and Terence Blanchard.

Houston said he didn't start playing music until 1993, when he was in college.

Born in Boston in 1972, Houston's parents moved to Fall River when he was in high school. He graduated from Durfee in 1992, and attended one year at Northeastern University where he took up medical studies, ultimately opting to pursue the flugelhorn and study jazz at Berklee College of Music. He studied there for two years and then transferred to the Harvard Extension School, earning his degree in 2001. He then decided to become a lawyer and went to Suffolk University, earning his law degree in 2005.

"I'm like a sponge," Houston said with a laugh. "I just wanted to learn and soak up all these different interests I had."

Daley: Were you musical at Durfee?

Houston: I was not a musical student at Durfee at all. I had a budding interest in music, but I was shy about it. I truly couldn't afford a horn, number one, and two, I couldn't play in my building. The neighbors would not have appreciated that. (laughs)

Daley: What music did you listen to? Were your parents musical?

Houston: There was always music in our home, from R&B to hip hop to classical to Frank Sinatra. "¦ I liked everything from jazz to classical, but I especially liked Frank Sinatra. I was the only kid in my whole neighborhood who liked Frank Sinatra. He wasn't a popular name with kids in my neighborhood. (laughs)

Daley: What were you like as a kid?

Houston: I was a pain in the neck. But I was into learning and reading. I was inquisitive. And that's who I am today.

Daley: When did you know that you wanted to play the horn?

Houston: After I got my first Miles Davis record, "Kind of Blue," when I was 19. And that's when I knew what I wanted to do. That record was just amazing. It inspired me to try new things musically, and that's' what jazz is about — personal expression.

I'm self-taught. I went and bought a trumpet and a do-it-yourself-for-dummies type book, and I taught myself how to play. I was going to Northeastern at the time, but I quickly became possessed by music. It was taking over my studies and attention. So I applied to Berklee College of Music (in Boston) where I studied with some of the best in the country.

Daley: Why did you leave Berklee?

Houston: I left Berklee because I wanted to study law. I wanted to learn a lot. "¦ So I got my law degree from Suffolk in 2005, and I moved back to Fall River in 2011.

Daley: What does jazz mean to you?

Houston: I want to bring jazz to the average person. A few years ago, people maybe thought of Wynton Marsalis or Miles Davis; today people think of Nora Jones or Kenny G. (laughs) I want to bring back the old-school music, like Wynton Marsalis. I want to bring back the origins. ...

We want to venture into a more fan-centric type of jazz — jazz that the average person walking down the street can understand. We're jazz ambassadors. We want people to appreciate what the music means — culturally, historically and musically.

Learn more about Houston at http://www.reverbnation.com/lancehouston.

Lauren Daley is a freelance writer and arts columnist for The Fall River Spirit. Contact her at ldaley33@gmail.com.

Never miss a story

Choose the plan that's right for you.
Digital access or digital and print delivery.